Mk3 golf Aerial choice?

[BugsyMalone666]

Right so the coming week or so im sorting out my golf with some bits of paint a new windscreen and a general smarten up to make it look like a GTi edition (its a driver).

now the cars a 94 meaning most rubber bits are starting to go including the rubber that mounts the stock aerial!

I was wondering what else fits the stock wing mount position?

I dont want to start drilling holes in any other parts of the body!

Any suggestions?

[tornadored7]

Bugsy,

In my opinion the Golf MK3 GTI in Tornado Red is a classic, and I like what you are trying to do, very similair to what I did to my MK3 TDi.

If you get a chance, I'd also recommend changing the Front and Back bumpers to GTI type half colour coded bumpers, (not the characterless latter VR6 fully colour coded).

Regarding the Aerial, you probably aren't going to like my suggestion, but I'll say it anyway.

The wing mounted aerial looks terrible, and ruins the GTI look. I went to the lengths of removing the wing mounted aerial, then filling, smoothing and painting hole remaining in the wing.

1) Roof Mounted Beesting Aerial

In true (latter) GTI style I was planning to mount the GTI beesting Aerial on the roof, but then considered leaks and also how much of pain washing and polishing would be.


2) "Invisible" Internal Aerial

Instead, I positioned the beesting Aerial in the boot, just by the side of the parcel shelf.

Since this was above the left tail light, but below the parcel shelf it was not visible from the outside or even within the boot.

True, this does somewhat defeat the purpose of an Aerial and radio reception wasn't as good (particularly in valleys/dales), the appearance was a markedly improved .

BTW if you are repositioning your Aerial, IIRC the radio cable is normally routed below the right side of the glove compartment. Buried somewhere underneath the plastic trim, the forward thinking VW Engineers provided a plug leading to the Radio's antenna input. You can plug you own aerial here instead of fishing for Aerial cables inside your wing.

I succesfully plugged the VW GTI Beesting aerial into this plug, and fed the cable through the A pillar and roof lining down, eventually emerging into the C pillar. This seemed like a good compromise between a wing mounted aerial and drilling a hole in the roof .

Regards,
TR7

[BugsyMalone666]

funnily enough i think you must be the second person who thinks my golf is tornado red from the picture, its classic red, very close and if it was tornado red would have been easier to get paint off the shelf for doing touch ups.

as you were saying about GTIing the look with the colour coding, thats exactly where im going with it, I have a 2 bar GTi grill, black VW badge, just managed to aqured a set of black clip on arches and the side skirts, i just need the top cover to the skirts which are about £25 each from vw.

Colour coding wise I agree, I have received paint today and other than a few rust bubbles im going to do the centres of the bumpers only, i have always thougth full colour bumpers look a bit odd! also have euro plate frames (wolfsburg ABT Tuning ones from fleabay) and a set of pressed german type plates which are actually done with uk font and gb symbol to keep it legal!

What I was thinking with the aerial is how does a bee sting type fit? if i got a black alloy beesting I could fit in place of the original aerial so it would be like a sort neat version but without having to do any cable running or mods.

currently also got bright silver wheels which might get `blacked out` with a red strip rim protector or something to create a tidy GTi look

[tornadored7]

Hi Bugsy,

I tried replying to this post yesterday, but accidentally hit the page back button resulting in loosing a fairly long reply ...

as you were saying about GTIing the look with the colour coding, thats exactly where im going with it, I have a 2 bar GTi grill, black VW badge, just managed to aqured a set of black clip on arches and the side skirts, i just need the top cover to the skirts which are about £25 each from vw.

Colour coding wise I agree, I have received paint today and other than a few rust bubbles im going to do the centres of the bumpers only

I'm not sure how well the original Golf MK3 Black bumper will deal with being painted. At the bare minimum I suppose it will need to be sanded/smoothed down, primed and painted. I bought new Front and Back partially colour coded bumpers which were pre-primed.

As you mentioned, there are other aspects of the GTI trim;

• Two Slat Grill
• Colour Coded wing mirrors
• Wheel arches and side skirts
• Bee Sting aerial
• GTI headlights
• Smoked rear light clusters
• Fog lights
• Front/rear mud guards

Personally, I'd advise against attaching the wheel arches for two main reasons;

1) Red coloured paint requires alot of polishing/waxing and cleaning to maintain a decent finish. The wheel arches make this task much more difficult.

2) Black plastic trim, tends to fade to grey, unless applying regular doses of Auto Glym Bumper care. This really detracts from the car's appearance. Even worse polish/wax residue on black plastic trim accelerates the fading and leaves white streaks !

What I was thinking with the aerial is how does a bee sting type fit? if i got a black alloy beesting I could fit in place of the original aerial so it would be like a sort neat version but without having to do any cable running or mods.

A wing mounted Beesting might work, may even look nice, but vandalism might be an issue ?

Actually, if you are mainly concerned about wiring the aerial it isn't difficult at all, but you will only appreciate this if you partially remove some of the glovebox/heating area trim.

The main difficulty with a roof mounted beesting, would be drilling a clean hole through the roof and loosening the ceiling trim.

currently also got bright silver wheels which might get `blacked out` with a red strip rim protector or something to create a tidy GTi look

I know the style you are eluding to, they do look good. Personally however, I'm more post modern Old Skool () and prefer 16H x 7J Bright Silver BBS RX alloys .

Cutting to the chase; my biggest concern would be from an insurance point of view. God forbid, but in the event of an insurance claim you won't necessarily be compensated for the enhanced value of your car.

Bearing this in mind, and the amount of work required to customise your car it may be worth considering purchasing a Golf MK3 SE. As I understand this came with some of the GTI trim as standard;

• Colour coded bumpers
• GTI head lights
• Smoked rear light clusters
• Wheel arches and side skirts

(I'm not completely sure about the 2 italicised items)


Since the SE wasn't available in TDi format, I adopted the more expensive customisation approach. I can understand insurance being an issue, so carefully evaluate a few insurance quotes for comparison.

Regards,
TR7

[BugsyMalone666]

I'm not going for a pure GTi look lol

basically my golf is a mk3 driver (I think they were only made for 1 year like mine) so it has black carpets bucket seats, smoked tail lights a rear spoiler on the window, clear front indicators and CL headlines/3 bar grill.

at the moment it has a 2 bar grill body coloured, black front vw badge, black front indicators and reflector panels with smoked front fog lights, along with a smoked hella twin headlight conversion (just tracked down a second set after having a highbeam get cracked)

I have lots of rust bubbles to repair round the very edge of the arches themselves so part of why i want clip on arches/side skirts other than the GTi look is so you wont notice the repairs and it should keep salt/spray hitting the repairs direct (although im sure it`ll get behind them eventualy)

I dont think vandelism will be to much of a problem with one of the small stumpy type beesting alloy aerials fitted to the wing as the current aerial is a stock one that wont retract under about 14" and no ones snapped it off (yet although im in the process of removing it)

I was supprised to find tonite when I started taking it out that not only does it have a huge earth cable that connects the the underbonnet and the bonnet but it also has a multiplug connector (2 wire connected to it) I presume it has some sort of built in booster explaining why its so good!

I have been looking round ebay for beesting aerial bases but havent come accross and good cheap ones as looking at the hole in the wing Im not sure i`ll be about to fit it easily and the last thing I want to do is spend a fortune and waste my time.

A wings easy to replace, a hole in the roof isnt!

What i was also looking at is the way the stock aerial fits into the wing, it seems to have a specialist rubber grommet with hole in the middle and I was thinking that maybe if i go down vw and get a new one I could litterly get a beesting unit and a stumpy alloy aerial and push it through the gromet from behind.